


More Than a Woman

by TrickWithATwist



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones
Genre: Budding Love, Emotional Constipation, F/F, Hugs, I spent way too much time trying to understand the logistics of how these damn things fly, Pegasi, Pegasus - Freeform, Pegasuses, sunrise
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-03
Updated: 2018-03-03
Packaged: 2019-03-20 05:50:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13711194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TrickWithATwist/pseuds/TrickWithATwist
Summary: Lute asks Vanessa to indulge in one of her experiments at dawn the night before Eirika's army is set to attempt to take Fort Renvall and (hopefully) find and save her brother Ephraim.





	More Than a Woman

**Author's Note:**

> https://open.spotify.com/track/4pHjt1Hs1ghsey8dHnViYX?si=DgTODC1wQs-LNZ9aGATaKA

"Hmm...so it is a filamentous structure similar to that of humans..." Lute said as she ran one of her hands through Titania's hair.

"And you couldn't just tell that by looking at it?"

"Don't misinterpret my words; I had read before that a pegasus's mane was extremely similar to our hair, however, that is it. It's quite a bit more fascinating to experience that fact firsthand."

"Right..." Vanessa let out a deep sigh. "Did you really wake me up before dawn in the middle of winter just to examine my pegasus's hair?"

"No, I had yet another request to ask of you."

"Which is?"

"...I wanted to test a hypothesis of mine, and to do so, I'd need to ride Vanessa approximately twenty meters into the air at the very least. Could you assist me with that?"

".../I'M/ Vanessa. My pegasus's name is Titania...and no. We have a battle later today against the Grado army stationed at Fort Renvall and she'll need all of her strength for then."

Lute furrowed her brow and shut her eyes as she thought and pondered a potential workaround. It only took her a brief moment before a smirk reimmerged onto her face and her eyes snapped open again.

"If your only issue with my request is the indefatigability of your pegasus, why could you not just simply ride her with me for a brief few minutes? If you are guiding your beast and making sure she doesn't begin to rapidly descend from fatigue or accrue too much exhaustion, while I simply ride behind you, would it not be fine?"

"...Regardless of my answer, you plan on asking me again and again until I comply, don't you?"

"In simpler terms, yes."

Another long, drawn out sigh left the viridian haired soldier.

"Fine, fine...just hang on tight and follow every command I say while we're there, okay?"

Lute responded silently with a nod as the pegasus knight walked around her to her mount's stable, grabbing and placing a saddle a top the animal before climbing up onto her upper back herself. Then, she extended a hand out for the mage to use to help pull herself up, landing on the pegasus's lower back with a plomf.

The two sat like that for a moment in slience, still on the ground before Lute, in her impatience, spoke up.

"Why are we not ascending yet?"

Vanessa turned her head to look over her shoulder back at the violet haired girl.

"You haven't done what I've asked of you yet..."

Lute stared blankly at the pegasus knight until finally Vanessa caved and took ahold of her arms, guiding them around her own waist.

"Things get bumpy in the air, especially when you're riding that close to the end of a pegasus; hold on tight until we land again, okay?"

Lute just looked at her, her earlier sense of confusion now gone, but replaced with another, more puzzling, almost warm, dizzying feeling instead. She pushed it aside momentarily to push out a quiet "Understood," holding her hand in her other as she clung on to the rider, who was now guiding her steed into a slow trot, before resuming her previous thoughts; she hated leaving anything unsolved or unexplained after all.

What was the source of this warmth she felt? Logic would dictate it was the pegasus, as it was the new variable she was experiencing, and the only other thing close enough would be Ti-...Vanessa. She had spoken to Vanessa several times before and not felt this kind of odd, almost soft feeling of warmth...or had she? What if she had been experiencing this same warmth during each of their conversations, but just to a lesser degree, and that it was their now close proximity that now allowed her to take notice of it? She supposed it was possible but...why? Why would she feel such a heat and why would her heart feel so, just from something as meaningless as this? Was it the pleasant scent of her braided hair? The way she always made sure her uniform was immaculate and straight? Was it the way the pegasus knight uniform was designed, the thin colored fabric in the center letting the mage feel the cut of the other's abs through the outfit? Was it the softness of her smile when she had guided the mage's hands around her waist earlier? Calm down, calm down; do not allow yourself to get caught up in feelings. Feelings are illogical, sensations are not, and that's what started this all, so start from scratch.

The mage inhaled deeply before starting her train of logic again.

It's the middle of winter. Logstically, due to her own light mage gowns and the relative chill she was experiencing due to the cold temperature around her, it would only make sense that clinging to another warm body would make her feel warm. There. An easy, simple answer. Nothing to do with Vanessa besides the fact she /existed/ and has a warmth radiating from her like all living beings did. How did she ever allow herself to get on that earlier tang-

Her train of thought was interupted as Titania began to gallop and then ascend upwards, the mage's eyes going wide at the sudden exposure to the new sensations. She could feel Vanessa's breathing remain steady by the gentle rise of her stomach as they went higher and higher up, the draft created by her wings ruffling up the mage's bob and causing her tiny twintails to float slightly and bounce around, drifting about as the pegasus rose higher and higher, slowly fluttering its wings with deliberate force to ascend at a pace sluggish enough to not overwhelm Lute on her first voyage into the sky yet still fast enough for the trio to go higher and higher into the sky, something the pegasus knight was making sure of as they went higher and higher, until Vanessa leaned her head to her right to look at the ground they were just previously on to judge the elevation they were at, before she turned around to look back at Lute as she done when they first got on to Titania's back. The sun was rising was beginning to rise over the horizon, the orange light of daybreak cascading on her hair and tinting it as it backlit the rest of her body. Lute stared, her mind uncharacteristically blank as she just looked and got lost. Her eyes fixated on the few out place strands of her green hair, traced the outline of her noise, resting briefly on the eclipse of yellow light that formed at the small point of her nose as the sun rose higher and higher, her eyes darting around more and more, she couldn't stop looking, she couldn't stop gazing deeper and deeper-

"Hey, are you feeling fine? You look a little light headed..."

"Perfect."

Lute's words left her mouth without much thought as all of her attention and mental systems were dedicated to finding and committing all of Vanessa's features to her memory. Vanessa, while worried, figured if Lute said she was fine, she was; she was a soldier after all. The pegasus knight just turned back around with a sigh, an action that immediately snapped Lute back to Earth. What...What had she been doing?

"Just let me know when you're done, okay? I'd prefer to get Titania out of the air as quickly as possible."

Lute blinked, not reacting. She...She just...It didn't matter. She'd work it out later. For now...her hypothesis. This was her chance to truly observe the horizon, the Frelian supply unit's arrival, and, most importantly, their sudden appearance on the horizon of the plain as they almost seemingly emerged from the ground, and as they got progressively larger and larger as they approached. Artur owed her two whole spell tests now. She swallowed hard to regain her composure before addressing Vanessa.

"Thank you. I have now conclusively proven to myself our planet's shape."

"...did you really make me fly you all the way up here just for that? And......what shape?"

"Yes, and, spherical."

"Finally, someone else who agrees with me! When I have trouble sleeping, I stargaze like I used to when I was a child, and a few nights ago, I noticed that certain stars are only visible in Renais, and that I couldn't for the life of me find this one really pretty and bright one my sister showed me when I was little, and when I tried telling Father Moulder about this all and how it meant the planet wasn't flat, he told me that while that made sense, I shouldn't question the word of the Gods like that."

Lute blinked before she smiled at Vanessa, a smile as big as she could manage. She really was perfect.


End file.
